The Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) comments that, although around 29,000 households would have escaped stamp duty last year if the starting threshold had been the new figure of £125,000 instead of £120,000, around 56,000 households became liable for stamp duty last year purely as a result of house price rises bringing their properties into the starting band. If the starting threshold had been uprated in line with house price inflation since Labour came into power in 1997, it would now be over £145,000.
Peter Williams, CML Deputy Director General, commented: "Although today gave us few dramatic new announcements, we welcome the Chancellor's continued commitment to delivering shared-equity schemes and increased home-ownership. We await with interest the advent of real estate investment trusts. But these are unlikely to have any significant impact on the supply of rented housing. Although the stamp duty starting threshold has helpfully been raised, the number of buyers who would have escaped stamp duty last year as a result of the uprating is outweighed by those who became liable for stamp duty as a result of rising house prices."
